Venture Capitalists Help Fight Software Flaws

Coverity, a company dedicated to finding flaws in software code before products hit the public, announced its first ever outside funding from two Silicon Valley venture firms.

“Software runs airplanes, cars and drug injection pumps–it should do what it’s supposed to and it should also be secure,” said Seth Hallem, Coverity’s young CEO, who founded the company five years ago based on technology he helped develop in Stanford’s Computer Science lab.

Coverity’s technology analyzes source code for critical flaws–mistakes made by developers. The problem it is trying to solve is so complex that 10 to 15 percent of its findings are false positives, Hallem said, but that’s a good result compared to competitors’ tools.

Meanwhile, software flaws continue to grow. A report issued last month by IBM said severe software flaws were up 28% in 2007 compared to 2006.

Coverity accepted $22 million from Foundation Capital and Benchmark Capital and will add seasoned managers to its board, including Tony Zingale, former CEO of Mercury Interactive, and Aki Fujimura, now CEO of D2S.

Until now Hallem and his colleagues have bootstrapped the company themselves, he said–winning 400 customers in the process–but they want to expand Coverity’s product line. Customers include Symantec, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the Department of Homeland Security.